Fontwell loses National Spirit card to waterlogging

Tony Kelshaw
February 22, 2024 4:57 pm

National Hunt fixtures continue to be hit by the weather.

Heavy rain around the UK continues to hit this week’s National Hunt fixtures, with Sunday’s top-class card at Fontwell and Friday’s meeting at Warwick falling to the weather.

The GBP 80,000 Grade Two Star Sports National Spirit Hurdle was to be the feature race of Fontwell’s biggest day of their centenary year.

However, persistent heavy rain has left standing water on the West Sussex venue, with 18mm falling prior to a 4pm inspection on Thursday.

Clerk of the course Philip Hide said: “The track is waterlogged and I’m seeing water lying where I’ve never seen it before.

“We just haven’t got any fresh ground to offer up to get any meaningful racing line, with a forecast for plenty more rain – although the forecast doesn’t have a lot to do with it, because it would need to improve a fair amount from where we’re at and there’s just no prospect of it happening.

“Even though I was expecting today to be wet, we’ve probably had 5mm above where I dreaded being. We had about 5mm in 25 minutes around 12 o’clock today.

“It’s an important race for us, but unfortunately, however much you want something to happen, you can’t make it happen. I couldn’t just keep going blindly forward, I’d be misleading people.

“It’s not a hard decision to make and it’s not a decision I’ll regret at any stage – I’m happy to have made it in a timely fashion, to be honest.

“Obviously, there’s a chance they might put the race on somewhere for those horses that have been waiting for it – I think Brewin’upastorm has had it as a target since winning it last year.”

Following another downpour at Warwick, the adjacent Gog Brook burst its bank and left the course unraceable due to waterlogging.

Officials quickly decided there would not be sufficient improvement ahead of raceday and called an early halt to proceedings.

A precautionary inspection has also been scheduled for 8am ahead of Exeter’s jumps meeting on Friday.

After 10.5mm of rain fell on Thursday morning, the ground was described as heavy but raceable, although the last hurdle in the backstraight is being omitted.

The prospect of further showers has forced officials to take another look at conditions in the morning.

Thursday’s meeting at Huntingdon was called off due to a waterlogged track, but prospects for Saturday’s big jumps meetings are more encouraging.

The Premier Raceday fixture at Kempton, which features the GBP 150,000 Coral Trophy Handicap Chase and a trio of Grade Two events, is set to be staged on going that is soft, heavy in places.

There has been plenty of rain in the Surrey area but the forecast is for sunshine and showers on Friday and Saturday.

Newcastle’s Eider Chase card is currently set to be run on ground described as heavy, soft in places.

Gosforth Park received less rain than expected over the last two days and a bright and breezy day is forecast for Friday.

Temperatures could drop to around zero for a short time at night, bringing the possibility of a light frost, but raceday has a predcited low risk of showers through the afternoon, with a light breeze and highs of 7C.